Mountains

Oldest Rocks

Great Smoky Mountains

National Park

North Carolina / Tennessee

Great Smoky Mountains National Park, North Carolina / Tennessee

A Wildlands Sanctuary
The Great Smoky Mountains, the majestic climax of the Appalachian Highlands are a
wildlands sanctuary preserving the world's finest examples of temperate deciduous
forest. The name Smoky comes from the smoke-like haze enveloping the mountains,
which stretch in sweeping troughs and mighty billows to the horizon.

The park boasts unspoiled forests similar to those early pioneers found. Restored log
cabins and barns stand as reminders of those who carved a living from this wilderness.
Fertile soils and abundant rain have encouraged the development of a world-renowned
variety of flora, including more than 1,500 kinds of flowering plants. In the coves,
broadleaf trees predominate. Along the crestat more than 6,000 feet
elevationare conifer forests like those of central Canada.

Wildflowers and migrating birds abound in late April and early May. During June and
July rhododendrons bloom in spectacular profusion. Autumn's pageantry of color usually
peaks in mid-October. For many, this is the finest time of year, with cool, clear days
idea for hiking. In winter, an unpredictable season, a peace pervades the park. Fog
rolling over the mountains may blanket the conifers in frost.

A scenic, high mountain road winds up through Newfoundland Gap, with a spur out
to Clingmans Dome and its observation tower. Along the road are superb views, and
those from the tower are truly panoramic. But roads offer only an introduction to the
Smokies. Some 900 miles of trails thread the whole of the Smokies' natural fabricits
waterfalls, coves, bards, and rushing streams. Each trail invites you into the intimacy
and richness of these high lands. The Smokies, a wild landscape rich with traces of its
human past, calls people back year after year.

The spectacular geology in our national parks provides the answers to many
questions about the Earth. The answers can be appreciated through plate tectonics,
an exciting way to understand the ongoing natural processes that sculpt our
landscape. Parks and Plates is a visual and scientific voyage of discovery!

Ordering from your National Park Cooperative Associations' bookstores helps
to support programs in the parks. Please visit the bookstore
locator for park books and much more.